


The Joy of Redemption

by SarahfromGermany



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghosts, Angst with a Happy Ending, But mostly fluff, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Major character death - Freeform, Not that sad despite major character death, One Shot, Post-Reichenbach, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-26
Updated: 2013-09-26
Packaged: 2017-12-27 16:36:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/981178
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SarahfromGermany/pseuds/SarahfromGermany
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John is finally happy again. And John will be reunited with the one person that mattered most in his life. He remembers past things and finds himself content with a decision he had made that afternoon and how his story now has found an end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Joy of Redemption

**Author's Note:**

> The idea for this short one-shot came to me this morning when I looked outside and the mist was looking beautiful in contrast to the red and yellow leaves of autumn. I hope you like it despite it not being the typical Post-Reichenbach-Reunion.  
> I honestly don't know if John and Sherlock were together before the things I described here so I'll let you make your own deductions, as I don't think it matters much in this story.

It was a sunny day. For once there were no clouds threatening pedestrians with rain and the gentle breeze brought the last warmth of summer with it. Taking a deep breath, John felt as if he could finally relax after years of nearly suffocating under the weight of his sorrow. His heart didn’t burn anymore, his hands were steady again and he didn’t need his cane at all. He felt good.

  
Strolling slowly through the streets of London he thought about all the times he ran after one criminal or another, trying to catch up to his best friend, trying to protect him from his recklessness. He had no idea how many times they had faced death in the form of guns, knives or an ordinary fist. He had no idea how many times they had nearly been run over by trucks, taxis or busses. He had no idea how many times a fast reflex had saved either of their lives.

  
It didn’t matter anymore. This part of his life was finished, this page in the book of his life had been turned and the story had led him elsewhere. At first he had been made to watch his life shatter on the cold hard ground, his tears mingling with the blood of a life he would dearly miss. Then he was forced to return time and time again to the one place he felt the closest to and would forever hate the most: A grave with a simple golden inscription, reflecting his silhouette that seemed so lonely without his counterpart now resting in the earth below his feet.

  
The pages of his story had been turned time and time again, but they were mostly empty compared to those filled with crime scenes, shouting matches and severed heads in the fridge. Now the pages held only basic information. That he had lost his job and found another one. That he didn’t care about dating anymore. That he spent most of his time sorting through old notebooks filled with information about cases he had never heard of. One chapter told the tale of how he had cleared his best friend’s name. Those pages were the only ones that were filled with more than boring descriptions of tedious days.

  
John didn’t mind that his story was filled with only a few names as these were people he had been close to once. He wondered briefly if they knew how much they meant to him but it didn’t matter in the end. Those parts of his story had found an end by now.

  
His mind was taking him back to one of the two places that still mattered to him. The first being the black gravestone where he had come from. The second being his old home: 221B Baker Street.

  
John slowly, deliberately walked up the stairs and went into the living room, smiling at the yellow smiley still adorning the wall behind the sofa.

“You’re here early.” Came a familiar drawl from the window and the soft violin tunes stopped.

  
“I know. I couldn’t wait any longer.” John replied and smiled a little. He couldn’t help feeling happy despite everything that had happened. He felt like he had during those precious months of crime solving with his best friend.

“Obviously.”

John slowly walked around the room, looking at familiar pieces of furniture, the well-worn books, the skull… There were so many memories inside this room but for once they didn’t make him sad.

“You do seem happy.”

“And you don’t.”

John smirked at the figure still looking at the road below and then walked over to him. He placed his hand on the other man’s shoulder, silently asking him to turn around. Sighing, the other man complied and met his gaze.

“Do I look like that, too?” John asked quietly, taking in the taller man’s appearance.

Sherlock nodded. “Yes. You really should have chosen to take some pills. It would have saved you the mess.” His hand carefully brushed over the side of John’s temple.

“But it wouldn’t have matched yours.” John smiled gently at him and pushed back the blood-soaked locks while wrapping his other arm around Sherlock’s waist.

“It hurt you.”

“No. Yours did hurt me. Mine made that pain go away.”

“It won’t ever go away.”

“The pain? But it did. It’s gone now.”

“Not the pain. The damage.”

Sherlock’s fingers ghosted over the side of his head, tracing the hole, memorizing the new structure.

“You’ll get used to it.”

“No I won’t. It’s my fault.”

And looking into Sherlock’s eyes, John could see that he wasn’t talking about the bullet wound that would mark his head for all eternity. He wasn’t talking about the fact that these kinds of wounds – the last wounds you ever got in your life – would look as if they were bleeding no matter how often you tried dab away the blood. It was a permanent reminder that it had cost you the most precious thing you had ever been in possession of: Your life.

John shook his head and used his hand on Sherlock’s neck to pull the other man down to his level. Their lips met and everything else seemed to disappear. It was all about touch, warmth, pressure and scent.

“Don’t ever think that it is your fault. It never was. You did what you had to do to keep me – us – safe. You had no choice.” John whispered, gazing intensely into Sherlock’s eyes after he had pulled away.

“But it cost your life in the end. I failed.”

“It didn’t cost my life in the end. I lost my life on the same day as you lost yours. It only took me a little bit longer to join you.”

“Doesn’t matter. You’re dead. He won. I lost.”

Sherlock’s voice sounded pained and he fixed his gaze onto something behind John. Probably the smiley on the wall, he did have a fondness for that thing.

“No Sherlock. Look at me. Look at me!” John waited for the other man’s gaze to return to his eyes. “He didn’t win. He died and gained nothing. I died and gained everything.”

When Sherlock shook his head in response John pressed his lips against his mouth again to stop a response and then, his voice clearly conveying that there were no further arguments allowed: “He killed himself on that day to make you jump and to separate the two of us. But he succeeded for only a short time. Yes, I was devastated. Yes, I will never forget the image of you falling or how you looked on the ground, broken, open eyed and so very still. I will never forget the grief I felt when I looked into your lifeless eyes. I will never forget the coldness I felt in my heart since that day. I will never forget the burning tears and the anger and the desperation of having lost the only thing that ever meant that much to me. But he didn’t succeed because I found a way out. I found a way back to you and if I had to put a bullet inside my head then fine. It doesn’t matter anymore. I am here. You are here. We are together and nothing can separate us ever again. He didn’t win. We won. We’re here and we are together.”

The lips pressing tenderly against his own and the hands gripping his waist even closer and the sheer volume of emotions conveyed in that single kiss told John that Sherlock finally understood. He gripped the lapels of Sherlock’s coat and returned the kiss hungrily. No more words needed to be spoken.

It was a sunny day. The leaves on the trees turned from green to yellow and red and everything looked beautiful in the orange glow of the evening sun. The breeze had picked up a little, making the leaves on the ground dance and the people walk faster. The sunshine illuminated even the ground under a tall tree with a headstone underneath. It shone gently onto the man seemingly sleeping next to the grave, his hand now holding the gun loosely.

No one looked up as they walked along Baker Street and even if they had, they wouldn’t have seen more than something glittering in the last rays of sunshine. The only ones to see the kissing couple with the matching head wounds were those who had already left the world of the living. Most of them would say that they didn’t agree with the method used for the reunion of these two men. But most of them still smiled softly at the happiness that radiated from 221B. It had been the promise of love and the pain of loss but now – finally – the joy of redemption. And who would disapprove of such a beautiful ending to such a beautiful story?


End file.
